BACKGROUND: There is a paucity of published research with regard to dominant preference and school readiness in preschool children, and what is available has become somewhat outdated. OBJECTIVES: To determine the dominant preference among grade 1 learners in Bloemfontein, and to determine whether the establishment of a dominant profile had an influence on school readiness of grade 1 learners in Bloemfontein. An additional purpose was to determine whether there was a statistically significant difference in obtaining school readiness between children with a mixed dominant preference profile and those with a pure dominant profile. METHODS: The Aptitude Test for School Beginners, which measures school readiness, and performance tests to determine the child's dominant eye, ear, hand and foot, were conducted on each of the 353 grade 1 learners who participated in the study. There were 161 boys and 192 girls from five different primary schools in Bloemfontein involved in this study. RESULTS: The results found that 62% of the children preferred their right eye, 68% preferred their right ear, 92% preferred their right hand and 90% preferred their right foot. A total of 54% of the children exhibited a mixed lateral preference, while only 46% exhibited a pure lateral preference of which only 4.2% had pure left dominance. Insignificant differences were found between the dominant profiles of boys and girls. CONCLUSION: Most of the participants were right-side dominant; gender did not influence dominant preference and dominant preference had no significant influence on school readiness.